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Friday, January 25, 2008

Bizarrely, FLIPPER is playing at Amoeba Music on Haight Street in SF for free on Monday February 18th at 6 PM. I rarely go to reunions, having High expectations and then often having them shattered into pieces- I'd rather just keep the image in my mind of the band at their prime... but "Generic" and " Gone Fishin'" have been on the turntable a lot lately that the pull of this being 15 minutes from my house and, uh, FREE...Will probably get me out...though the bar here of my expectations is high and will be severly smashed if FLIPPER do not manage to drive every single customer not specifically there to see them irrevocably out of the store with torrents of droning noise.Reading their Wikipedia Entry it seems in a weird turn of downward mobility the Punk scene has traded Pat Smear for Nirvana's Bassist, I guess What better way to find yourself in post rock star dom than to joinFLIPPER!Above ancient Photo of Flipper from the Punk Globe Website, Which has a lot of cool old SF punk photos if you dig around it.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

While compiling my "best of 2007" releases for Maximum Rock"n' Roll's next issue today, I was struck by the sheer insanity of happenings and tours in May of 2008. I already posted about The SYSTEMATIC DEATH / TRAGEDY shows, The SEVERED HEAD OF STATE / BLOWBACK TOUR and CHAOS IN TEJAS happening that month. But then Australia's STRAIGHT JACKET NATION are doing a full US TOUR. FRANCE's GASMASK TERROR are touring the East Coast with BLACK DOVE who feature ex-members of THE AWAKENING ( !!). Over at LA VIDA ES MUS Spain's INVASION's U.S. Dates are going to be posted soon. ( and stoked also to see Paco will do THE WANKY'S record on LP! Total cheese grater guitar distortion madness) and HARD SKIN are also doing more shows around the Tejas dates....Busy Month!!! IRON LUNG and HATRED SURGE will also leave for an Australian tour in Late May.

I guess it's a busy year in general for tours, with Sweden's FY FAN on tour on the west coast in March and Summer U.S. tours from L.A's AGAINST EMPIRE and awesome band GIUDA from Italy on tour this summer with AGHAST

and late breaking news is apparently a re-fomred FORWARD will also play this gig!

In related Paintbox news, the prank vinyl pressings of Paintbox "Singing Shouting Crying" and "Earth Ball Sports Tournament" have been mastered and the band is currently finishing artwork and lyric translation. These were mastered at George Horn Mastering in Berkeley and there's a slightly different side break than the Canadian Press of "Singing Shouting" on the great late label UGLY POP to allow for a little better audio fidelity. "Earthball Sports Tournament" will be on vinyl for the first time and receive the deluxe gatefold treatment.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

KYLESA is headed on tour with fellow Savannah band BARONESS! Dates below.

As an added treat, Robert from ARTIMUS PYLE is filling in on Bass for Kylesa on this tour. Go Say Hi!

The Kylesa "S/T" has finally been re-pressed with vinyl available now and CD's shortly.There were a bunch of reasons this has been out of print for so long- Pushead wanted to re-draw / re-mix or add parts of the cover ( An idea which was after many months, scrapped) , prank's finances leaving Mordam were difficult, and after pressing it several times previously We focused on some of the back catalog that has been out of print for even longer. With 70 + titles "In print" now, it's even harder-and probably less necessary to keep everything available at once. Anyway, it's one of our favorite LP's We've released and we hope to keep it supplied without interruption here out, KYLESA have the vinyl on the road as well as copies of the prank "110 Degree Heat Index" 7" . This Lp third press is differentiated from the first pressing black vinyl by having red labels.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

I posted Earlier about BSA- Talked to Timmy this morning and late last night,BASTARD SONS OF THE APOCALYPSE'S van that they were traveling in caught on fire inbetween Las Cruces and El Paso. Their Equipment, Remaining merch, band fund, Remaining distro, and personal belongings, as well as the rest of the BSA Lp's -everything except for the guitarrist's guitar which he heroically saved, were all burned beyond repair. They are catching a Greyhound to El Paso later today, then renting a Car to get them back to Austin, and Everyone is okay but in need of a helping hand.

A friend of the band is offering a a benefit CDR of BSA's New LP here's the info:" i am going to burn a copy of the new lp on to cd and sell it for $5.00 ppd (sliding scale if You can afford to pay more). in order to raise money for them. please help your fellow bastard sons of apocalypse out.

Partners in Crime will be issuing a FOUR LP box or set of the complete discography of SYSTEMA, and Tragedy will be playing other shows in the Northeast Before these gigs. SYSTEMATIC DEATH's materail were recently re-issued in Japan on CD on FADE IN RECORDS More info as It comes in. SYSTEMATIC DEATH will also be playing Amsterdam, London and Bristol!

TRAGEDY are also playing before this on the East coast:FRI / APRIL 25TH BOSTON, MASAT / APRIL 26TH ALBANY, NYSUN / APRIL 27TH BUFALLO, NY MON / APRIL 28TH CLEVELAND, OHTUE / APRIL 29TH PITTSBURGH, PAWED / APRIL 30TH RICHMOND, VATHU / MAY 1ST PHILADELPHIA, PA

Partners in Crime are roaring back from a long break with a great re-issue of the legendary 80's cult band GAS from Hiroshima, Japan- this was issued awhile back on Arise Records from Japan on CD-only ( which you can get through Record Shop Base and is 20 classic tracks from that proto era of japanese hardcore- combining the quick attack of STALIN but starting to incorporate some of the more progressive and metallic infleunces of later Japanese hardcore.

This is the first time a lot of the material appears on hard Vinyl, being previously on ( now super collectable) flexis, some live sound board tracks. People here are probably most familiar with their couple of tracks off "The Punx" Cassette that was booted in Europe onto LP and everywhere a few years back.

I first Heard Gas when I used to tape trade with Phil and Dean from Extreme Noise Terror ( who, if you look a their site, are apparently playing Gilman Street, Portland and L.A. in Mid April ??) in the late 80's and early 90's, as they would tour there and bring back mounds of Records... They'd dub some of the best off on tapes for me and I'd then blast this stuff driving around rural Alabama, and re-listening to it now it's still stands up as distinctive and fresh material from a period where the Japanese Hardcore style was still evolving. Billy reports this vinyl version to mastered by Bob Weston so curious to hear the finished version from this new studio! Kudos to Billy and P.I.C. For making this available here!You can get more info and order the record HERE

Monday, January 14, 2008

One of Prank's most anticipated releases to unleash in 2008 is the upcoming WORLD BURNS TO DEATH "The Graveyard of Utopia" 8 song LP. This was tracked initially at Our House studio in Tokyo after the WB2D 2007 Japanese tour. Our House is where many of the legendary Japanese hardcore LP's and Deathreat's "Consider It War" 12", the recent ARTIMUS PYLE 7" on Insane Society/ Too Circle, etc were recorded and This record features cameos from a lot of luminaries from the Japanese scene-Backing vocals on one track from Ishiya from FORWARD, Solos from Souici from FORWARD and Keiro from AKUTARE and a blazing solo from Chelsea from PAINTBOX...R.I.P..

Parts of the record were later re-tracked at THE BUBBLE in Austin with Frenchie Smith, who recorded SIGNAL LOST'S "Prosthetic Screams", and Signal Lost's vocalist Ashley even contributes some backing vocals to a track on this new LP. It's a different record than the last outing by WB2D " totalitarian Sodomy" as WB2D continue to evolve.There's some final studio and artwork tweaks and We hope to be in production by Mid-February.

This is a split release between Prank and HG FACT , with them handling the CD version and Prank releasing the vinyl. Since they've long been the headquarters of everything WB2D, Hardcore Holocaustwill handle the limited version of the LP when it's released, hopefully in May.

World Burns to Death are tenatively doing a short European tour of Northern Europe ( Scandinavia- Germany- Poland- Czech) in June. Jon has kids and a real job, so the tour has to be short and Can't go everywhere, but they are most likely hitting several major fests worth travelling for if you live in a different part of Europe. Here's the tenative schedule they're working with:

Friday, January 11, 2008

For the last Year or so, Funeral Shock/ Case of Emergency vocalist and Record collector extrodinaire, Negative tom and I have split a table at the KUSF Rock'n' Swap. It's billed as the largest record swap in Northern California, but more accurately described, it's solid medium sized, mostly - but not entirely-vinyl record show that's held pretty regularly. All the proceeds from the door and the table rental help with the operating budget of the radio station - SF's main community free form radio station, so it's a worth cause ( and for what it's worth, I really recommend Carolyn Keddy's from MRR's show on Tuesday from Noon to 3 for the best in Garage Punk- always writing down band names when I tune in..

Over the years I've found a good bit of cool records at the KUSF swap- F " you are an Ep" 12", Confederate LP, Gears Lp ($2!), Black FLag KLOS interview LP, The ebba Gron 12" catalog, Minor Threat " filler" 7", Plugz LP, Zerstorte Jugend 2nd 12", Tools 7", Plane Jane and the Jokes 12", Varaus 1-sided 12" and 7", Los VIoladores 2nd 12", Decry 7", "Half Skull" 7", Sealed "Cleanse the bacteria", Die Kreuzen "Cows and Beer" 7", Follow Fashion Monkeys Lp are a few of the ones that stick out in mind, but I've bought stacks and stacks of vinyl there over the years..The sellers at it are largley music fans who scower Yard Sales, Estate sell offs, Buy collections and generally do so to fund their record buying habits and pick up a few bucks. People get turned off by the "Record collector Fair" tag, but Prices of everything are rarely outrageous, often much cheaper than stores or online for more common stuff, and it's mostly a lot of dealers buying stuff off each other to keep, flog off on their online store, upgrade, trade or whatever. So come out. I sell A lot of old records of all types at this thing, but also now will sell Prank Titles at near-wholesale to encourage people to come out.

When I was collecting records in the 90's all the good ( I.E. finnish and Swedish Hardcore) records were in the $1 bin, so get out there and dig, it's up to you to find, preserve and maintain the history!

Austin-Portland Collaboration SEVERED HEAD OF STATE featuring Members of J-Church, Tragedy., World Burns to Death,Resist, Detestation, Signal Lost and more will tour in May with Japanese band BLOWBACK, who after several Ep's are about to release their debut LP on HG FACT . Blowback's new LP " living Vibration" will also get a US pressing on vinyl on Black Water Records, hopefully in time for the tour. World Burns to Death played shows with BLOWBACK in Japan and marked them as one of their favorite live bands of the tour, so You're in for a treat!

Thursday, January 10, 2008

I do reviews for Maximum Rock'n'Roll, being re-drafted after doing reviews in the 1990's after Will Born/Dead left on another of his long tours. The first Issue of MRR I ever bought was #8 ( click on that link to read the entirte issue as a pdf- awesome!) with the Pushead Skateboard cover at the old location of Cheap Thrills in San Luis Obispo in '83/'84 and I was a subscriber for Years when I moved back to Alabama. It's a magazine that means and meant a lot to me as a lifeline to a broader punk scene when I lived in the middle of Nowhere. The have a great crew of folks running the magazine, presently and over the last few years, and the quality of the issues lately has been consistently high, but I really have felt for a few years now that the magazine is missing it's mark by not having a more aggressive online prescence and serving the role it did in the 1980's- as a conduit for connecting people to bands, fanzines, tours,labels and so forth. This role has largely been ceded to ( corporate) Myspace and websites with real-time, updated daily content, and as a fan of the magazine it's sad to see MRR recede into the shadows, where I feel it should retain that role as the focal point of underground DIY hardcore info.......anyway, More on this later. But I Still do reviews , otherwise I would never discover great things Like PESD...and other offbeat yet cool stuff that comes out of Europe, though at times it seems no one seems to READ these reviews, and six or eight months later people then catch on to KVOTERINGEN or whoever I was giving the nod to in the grimy newsprint six or eight months before... so here's one of the coolest records I've heard out of europe in awhile:

OKAY- NOW THIS IS FUCKING GREAT. An amazing and totally bleak and definitely their best- third LP from this finnish band, combining a more muted and moody take on DISFEAR-style rocked out guitar riffs, Savagely shouted vocals Ala’ VICTIMS, and then the dark and Epic scope of NEUROSIS ( and their Slower, ow end Lumbering) , TRAGEDY ( mood carrying guitar riffs and solos) ARTIMUS PYLE ( bursting from all of that into wicked thrash) and their ilk. The Recording is crazy serious and megalithic, allowing the weight of the riffs to be literally oppressive and powerful then just clearing enough space for the band to blast fast thrashier parts. Top knotch musician ship, The mood of the whole affair somber as it can get, and while this metallic influenced crust style is seems at times almost completely currently dismissed stateside / locally, if you like any of the five bands I just mentioned, buy this immediately. AWESOME. ( COMBAT ROCK INDUSTRY, P.O. Box 65, Riihimaki, Finland )

**disclaimer the MP3's of their Myspace from this LP have like 1/10th the sound fidelity and power that the LP actually has....

Timmy , who organized the last couple "Chaos In Tejas" as well as the "Prank Fest" that preceded it was just out here on tour with Bastards Sons Of the Apocalypse BSA played a great show at the re-opened ( and really swank) Benders with Needles, Acephalix and Dopecharge. BSA have tests of their new 12" on tour with them, which is a cool listen - it's VERY old school/ retro-sounding, but reminds me of a '80's SAVAGE BEAT records Like PIG CHILDREN,, where maybe it's not re-writing the wheel, but has the right spirit and energy and is done really well, though BSA lean much more on the D-beat than OC. More than recommended fun listen, even with the use of - google.images.noose for the cover. ( see "sunday Morning Einsteins "Sannigen Om" and tour records everywhere..)Anyway Timmy is still trying to hammer out Headliners and everything for the fest, but it's on and the dates are May 15th,16th and 17th , once again at Emo'sHe said, so far these bands are playing:

Acursed " Tunneln I Ljusets Slut" LP's Showed up yesterday on a truck- Prank is now experimenting with a trucking company to move everything around California, as the UPS bills were just getting stupid. Less bills on things like freight, more records I can make/re-press,etc..so trying to economize.. originally Prank was just to do the CD Version of this LP and the great Swedish Label Putrid Filth Conspiracy were going to do the LP, as they have released the other Acursed full length and Split LP. In the intervening four years since "Tunneln" was recorded however, PFC have slowed down activity, ( just releasing a new, final LP by RAJOITUS - I haven't heard this yet, but their LP's digging all the way back to the '90's on DISTORTION and also Recent one on HARCORE HOLOCAUST both wailed) So now Prank is doing both formats. This was supposed to be out awhile ago, but all sorts of stupidity with the digipak CD printing held it up- the CD version should be done in a week / ten days

Anyway, the Acursed was a long journey waiting on the proper master, the Art, which is suprising once you see the minimalism of the LP ( there's no insert, there's even no SONG TITLES!) and I'm glad it's finally out. It's a total dim the lights, brew some coffee and play loud in the middle of winter kind of record and a great record to start 2008 with. Mastered by George Horn, pressed at RAINBO ( who did a stellar job with the colored vinyl- it's a weird milky clear- not quite grey, and no, not quite-ahem- "semen" either, dorks :). Rainbo are an efficient and great place to make records, but have automated presses, so there's a little less on the fly felixbility that you have at a place with hand presses ( G/z, Bill SMith) for weird colors, so I'm stoked they did such an excellent job here. Bored of Standard reds, whites, greens.

Here's my sales pitch for the Acursed :"Brutal, devastating metallic hardcore from Sweden, over loaded with feedback as it blasts track after track of savagely shouted, throttling hardcore that slows only to deliver mid-tempo crushing blows . ACURSED, like many of the classic Swedish punk bands, are enigma that surfaces haphazardly to unleash a new set of harsh tracks, previously with several records on Sweden's PUTRID FILTH CONSPIRACY label and the DISTORTION label. Akin to the HIS HERO IS GONE / TRAGEDY/ FROM ASHES RISE school of dark riffs and mood, and the classic original " Prank Sound", " "TUNNELN I LJUSETS SLUT" is ACURSED's years-in-the-making prank debut, and one of the most bleak releases on the label yet- with minimal artwork, the band chose to not even provide song titles in the packaging to keep from distracting from the music and mood. Members also play in VICTIMS( Havoc Records), SUNDAY MORNING EINSTEINS ( Prank), SAYYADINAs ( Sound Pollution)."

Acursed have a brief interview in the new issue ( #55) of Profane Existence Magazine . As posted above the band only surface haphazardly, and Jon has been busy with SAYYADINA( the last Sound pollution LP - even if you get scared off by the "grind" tag was a really great record- combining that with your standard wailing Swedish punk influences that I think it has a broader appeal than most "grind' records...but just as much brutality, check it out) and VICTIMS have a new Lp out any day on Combat Rock Industry. I think Havoc is distro-ing this stateside . Acursed and SME drummer Anton is criminally not behind a drum kit right now, but is busy with Sanctuary in Blasphemy singing and playing guitar with the man, the myth, Jens on Drums. I swear if accordian and bagpipes got suddenly adopted into all Hardcore and metal, all these Swedish dudes would master that too.